After helping to coordinate the Lend-Lease program, Harriman served as Roosevelt's personal envoy to the United Kingdom, then as the ambassador to the Soviet Union, and attended the major World War II conferences.

The Harriman business interests seized under the act in October and November 1942 included:[citation needed] The assets were held by the government for the duration of the war, then returned afterward; UBC was dissolved in 1951.

The joint agreement would establish American and British goals for the period following the end of World War II—before the U.S. was involved in that war—in the form of a common declaration of principles that were eventually endorsed by all of the Allies.

[8] Harriman was subsequently dispatched to Moscow to negotiate the terms of the Lend-Lease agreement with the Soviet Union in September 1941, together with the Canadian publishing millionaire Lord Beaverbrook, who represented the United Kingdom.

[10] Likewise, General George Marshall was advising President Roosevelt that it was inevitable that Germany would crush the Soviet Union, and predicted that the Wehrmacht would reach Lake Baikal by the end of 1941.

[9] He also pointed out that the defeat of the Soviet Union would free up three million men of the Wehrmacht for operations elsewhere, allowing Hitler to shift money and resources from his army to his navy and potentially increasing the threat to the United States.

[19] In August 1942, Harriman accompanied Churchill to the Moscow Conference to explain to Stalin why the western allies were carrying out operations in North Africa instead of opening the promised second front in France.

[20] Harriman had spent much time after the meeting at the Kremlin reminding Churchill that the Allies needed the Soviet Union and to try not to take Stalin's remarks too personally, saying the fate of the world was hanging in balance.

[21] Churchill rejected this suggestion, sending a telegram to Roosevelt full of hurt feelings saying: "I do not underrate the use that enemy propaganda would make of a meeting between the heads of Soviet Russia and the United States at this juncture with the British Commonwealth and Empire excluded.

[25] Although Harriman was one of the richest men in the United States, running a vast business empire comprising investments in railroads, aviation, banks, utilities, shipbuilding, oil production, steel manufacturing, and resorts, this in fact endeared him to the Soviets who believed he represented American capitalist ruling class.

[30] At Tehran, Roosevelt told Stalin that as a "practical man" who was planning to run for a fourth term in 1944 that he had to think of Polish-American voters, but that he agreed that the Soviets could keep the part of Poland they had annexed in 1939, provided that this was kept a secret until the 1944 election.

[41] On December 14, 1944, Stalin spelled out to Harriman what these political conditions were, namely that the Soviet Union be allowed to lease the Chinese Eastern Railroad and the ports on the Liaotung peninsula and for China to recognize the independence of Outer Mongolia.

[45] The Livadia palace had been built in 1910–11 as a summer residence for the Emperor Nicholas II and his family, and was designed to house only 61 people, hence the presence of a 215-strong American delegation literally overwhelmed its facilities.

[46] On February 8, 1945, Roosevelt, Harriman and Charles "Chip" Bohlen who served as the interpreter met Stalin, Molotov and the translator Vladimir Pavlov to discuss the Soviet entry into the war against Japan.

[49] Roosevelt stated that he could not inform the Chinese at present because whatever was said to them "was known to the whole world in twenty-four hours", but he would tell them when the time was right; much to Harriman's mirth, Stalin promised he could "guarantee the security of the Supreme Soviet!

Harriman's long friend Truman believed that the United States, which was a Protestant majority country, would never elect a Catholic president, which led him to oppose Senator John F. Kennedy in the 1960 Democratic primaries.

During a visit to New Delhi to meet the Indian prime minister Nehru, Harriman met an exiled Lao Prince Souvanna Phouma, who favored neutrality for his nation in the Cold War.

[74] On his way to Vientiane, he stopped in Saigon to meet the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, General Lemnitzer, who agreed with Harriman's plans to send troops to Laos to improve the American bargaining position.

[84] Khiem replied that he had warm memories of American aid to the Viet Minh in World War II, and said he was surprised that the United States had supported France in an attempt to take back its lost colony after 1945.

[89] Harriman's image was that of a crusty and autocratic elder statesman whose brusqueness and bad temper were legendary in Washington, but whose counsel was greatly valued by Kennedy who appreciated him for his sound judgement on international affairs.

[96] The second cable instructed Henry Cabot Lodge Jr, the American ambassador in Saigon, to support a coup if Diem did not exile his younger brother and his sister-in-law whom both Hilsman and Harriman thought were the source of the crisis.

[100] Harriman argued that before the pagoda raids, it was impossible to know the true state of South Vietnamese public opinion, but the massive demonstrations with millions protesting in the streets showed the Diem regime was deeply unpopular.

[103] According to Corson, Dunn's role in the incident has never been made public but he was assigned to Ambassador Lodge for "special operations" with the authority to act without hindrance; and he was known to have access to the coup plotters.

[108] Kosygin stated that he knew Ho Chi Minh, whom he called an honorable man, and told Harriman that if the Americans wanted peace, then should open talks with North Vietnam.

[109] Reflecting an earlier simmering feud, Harriman was appalled when Johnson's newly appointed National Security Adviser, W.W. Rostow, told him that he did not expect the bombing of North Vietnam to continue to such point that it finally caused a nuclear showdown between the Soviet Union and the United States, saying that only from extreme situations do lasting settlements emerge.

[112] When Aubrac asked if the United States could temporarily stop the bombing as a sign of good faith, Johnson under Rostow's influence refused, which marked the end of Operation Pennsylvania.

[112] In July 1967, Harriman was silent at a meeting when Johnson considered the advice of his Defense Secretary Robert McNamara to stop bombing North Vietnam, apparently wanting to be within the presidential inner circle again, which kept him from speaking his mind.

[119] In a sign of his opposition to the peace talks, Rusk refused to allow Harriman to fly to Paris on a State Department plane, telling since he was a billionaire that he could afford his own flight.

[128] Tho then made a concession, saying that South Vietnam could continue as a state, provided the Viet Cong were allowed to join a coalition government, and said that Hanoi wanted diplomatic relations with Washington.

It is located on an 11,000-acre (45 km2) wildlife refuge in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and is home to an abundance of elk, moose, sandhill cranes, trumpeter swans, and the occasional black or grizzly bear.